Some ant architects design a colony to cut the risk of disease. Humans, take note!

"Ants are many things. They're hard workers and intensely social. They're quite strong for their size. And now they may also be a source of architectural inspiration too for designing spaces that reduce the spread of disease. This discovery comes from a new study focused on Metarhizium brunneum, a common and lethal fungus for insects, including the black garden ant. For this fungus to propagate, it kills its host, taking over the host ant's dead body and transforming it into something called a sporulating cadaver."

""It's basically completely covered in spores and is highly infectious," says Nathalie Stroeymeyt, a behavioral ecologist at the University of Bristol. In research in the journal Science, she and her colleagues report that black garden ants manipulate the structure of their nests to respond to this fungal pathogen and slow down its transmission. Social distancing, ant-style In 2018, Stroeymeyt and her colleagues published a study that considered how small colonies of black garden ants respond socially to the introduction of the lethal fungus."

"The scientists glued tiny squares of paper with QR-like codes to the thoraxes of the ants and used an automated video tracking system to follow the movements of individuals over time. The infected workers quickly self-isolated. "They spend more time out of the colony to prevent contamination of their nestmates," she says. In addition, some of the healthy ants the nurses that take care of the queen, eggs and larvae increased their distance from the foragers."

Black garden ants respond to the lethal fungus Metarhizium brunneum by altering social behavior and nest structure to slow pathogen transmission. The fungus kills infected insects and converts corpses into sporulating cadavers covered in infectious spores. Infected workers self-isolate and spend more time outside the colony to avoid contaminating nestmates. Nurse ants that care for the queen, eggs and larvae increase distance from foragers, who face higher disease risk. Automated tracking with QR-like tags on thoraxes revealed movement patterns and isolation behavior. Nest architecture is manipulated by ants as an additional means to reduce spread of infection.

Read at www.npr.org